Lake-I Area Rep Explains His Intervention in Relocation Effort

Mark King

According to the area representative, the expedited process should be completed by the end of this week. That was, of course, for the initial list of squatters who needed to be relocated. The additional names would require identification of other parcels in Cotton Tree Village. Nonetheless, King encourages residents to follow the existing procedure to acquire land lawfully.

Mark King, Area Representative, Lake-I

“By, I’d say, end of the week a lease should be granted to them in Cotton Tree. So it is very good that we have gotten the situation solved to an extent that these people will have a land. Again, as we all know, I keep on saying to everybody that there is no land in Belize City so don’t try applying for one in Belize City. Wherever the government gives us land as the representatives that’s where we give and we say, “look, here is a piece of land.” In this case, the people, to me they have no choice, they are already on somebody’s land, they are already being evicted and it is only, the only thing I can do now is to try and get them a piece of land. I know they want it in the city but I can’t force my hand and I can’t force the government’s hand because you know land in Belize City is almost done and it’s expensive. So at the end of the day I think we are doing good enough to give them that piece of land and we’ll see how the transition goes between now and next week. At the end of the day, like I said, I don’t want this to be the precedence set that we’re going to give illegal squatters land. They can still, if you’re a Belizean and you live in Lake-I and you need a piece of land and you’re squatting, there’s a process of either coming to my office or the Lands Department so we can help you. It takes a while, so we need you to come in early and at the end of the day I want them to know that I went out of my way to try and get them that land.”

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